What retro things have you done today?

It was an auction on eBay. I only think there were two bidders. Delivery was about a third of the cost.

I've decided to build a slow XP PC. Normally I just use my Core 2 Duo or my PCIE S939 PC. But I'm finally putting a Dell motherboard to use that I picked up a while back. It is Socket 478 and I dug out a 3.4GHz HT P4 for it. I'm going to try out my GeForce 3 ti 200, mx440 (full fat version) and GeForce 6600GT.

I'm hoping to expand my XP game collection once again!

Turns out the P4 3.4GHz is either too hot or just generally unstable...
 
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I’m now pretty convinced that my 486 motherboard is a lost cause.

With nothing plugged in except CPU, RAM and keyboard I get nothing other than a repeating beep. The odd thing is the been changes depending on if I use my ST Microelectronics DX2 66 or my Intel DX2 66.

With the ST I get a single 1 second beep, repeating endlessly. This beep code doesn’t appear to exist in any Award BIOS documentation.

With the Intel I get a single 2 second beep repeating endlessly. Again nothing specific documented anywhere I can find on the web.

Endless beeping typically would be a RAM error, however:

1) The RAM (the board takes either 30 pin or 72 pin SIMMs) is known good. The 30 pin stuff works in my 386SX, and the 72 pin is good in my Pentium MMX.

2) Why do I get different beeps between the two CPUs? If it were a specific error would the code not be identical?

I do have an ISA POST diagnostic card on the way, but I don’t know if this board supports it.
 
paradigm said:
I’m now pretty convinced that my 486 motherboard is a lost cause.

With nothing plugged in except CPU, RAM and keyboard I get nothing other than a repeating beep. The odd thing is the been changes depending on if I use my ST Microelectronics DX2 66 or my Intel DX2 66.

With the ST I get a single 1 second beep, repeating endlessly. This beep code doesn’t appear to exist in any Award BIOS documentation.

With the Intel I get a single 2 second beep repeating endlessly. Again nothing specific documented anywhere I can find on the web.

Endless beeping typically would be a RAM error, however:

1) The RAM (the board takes either 30 pin or 72 pin SIMMs) is known good. The 30 pin stuff works in my 386SX, and the 72 pin is good in my Pentium MMX.

2) Why do I get different beeps between the two CPUs? If it were a specific error would the code not be identical?

I do have an ISA POST diagnostic card on the way, but I don’t know if this board supports it.
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Hopefully the post card can shed some light on it!

I might have a go on my broken socket 7 board tonight and add some solder to the dry looking connections on the ram. Other than that I think its a write off so might send it your way if you fancy a go.

The same thing. Repeated beeps. Although I havnt tried any other cpus. I do have 2 different sets of known working ram that I have tried but to no avail.
 
I did a bit of testing to see how my GeForce 3 ti 200 holds up with my MX440 128bit.

It was rather filthy...

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So I gave it a clean and now it looks great!

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In terms of how it compares to my other go-to AGP cards:

3DMark 2000:
MX440 = 9,752
3 ti200 = 10,782
6600GT = 15,393

3DMark 2001:
MX440 = 6,760
3 ti200 = 7,450
6600GT = 16,391

3DMark 2003:
MX440 = 345
3 ti200 = 1,141
6600GT = 8,324

Quake 3 Arena:
MX440 = 167 fps
3 ti200 = 191 fps
6600GT = 321 fps

Return to Castle Wolfenstien:
MX440 = 87 fps
3 ti200 = 90 fps
6600GT = 90 fps

COD2 (DX7):
MX440 = 20 fps
3 ti200 = 33 fps

It's a pretty quiet card so I think it'll replace my MX440 as my go-to card now. The 6600GT is incredibly loud and requires a molex connector, and my power supply is a bit broken so I only have one molex connector.
 
Finished building up the 3rd P3 PC. Will be keeping this one for sure!
P3 600mhz
asus p2b
256mb ram
Geforce 2 mx400 64mb.
40GB Ide HDD
Windows 98se installed

Just need a soundcard.



Also sorted out all of my motherboards and cards so that there is no more pcb-pcb contact so no chance of any accidental damage.

 
LewisRaz said:
Finished building up the 3rd P3 PC. Will be keeping this one for sure!
P3 600mhz
asus p2b
256mb ram
Geforce 2 mx400 64mb.
40GB Ide HDD
Windows 98se installed

Just need a soundcard.
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What sound card are you going for, something like an SB Live! 1024?

Are you not tempted to ditch the MX for a full blown Geforce2 or GeforceSDR/DDR?

Or a left-field choice, a Kyro/KyroII?
 
paradigm said:
What sound card are you going for, something like an SB Live! 1024?

Are you not tempted to ditch the MX for a full blown Geforce2 or GeforceSDR/DDR?

Or a left-field choice, a Kyro/KyroII?
Click to expand...

I have no idea really about period correct soundcards. Was just waiting to see what falls into my hands from around 1999.

I was more tempted to to riva TNT2 as the geforce 2s are from 2000+. I did also try my luck on a voodoo 3 3000 agp but missed it.

I think I just want to make 2 systems that would have been configurations available at the same time. Its easy to find release dates for things but not as easy to find what prebuilt pc configs were around this era. (maybe im just not searching so well).

Today I am going to test the PSU that came with the AT case using my dead S7 board as a test dummy (Yes I could turn it on with nothing attached but want a small load at least).

Quite open to any of your suggestions as to what would be period correct parts for the 600mhz and 750mhz p3s. The primary use of both machines will be to play conquest frontier wars over LAN but also the faster one will be my main go-to retro pc.
 
the AT psu is confirmed working :) slight rattle in the fan but can easily deal with that.
Had a busy day today. Finished setting up the 600mhz p3 and took the chance to test out my ISA sound card which works great. (It will be moving to the socket7 system eventually.) Also put a HDD in the 1ghz compaq p3 and managed to find and install most of its drivers. Also won a couple of auctions today by "accident".



These 3 soundcards for £7 and also another geforce 2 mx 400 for 99p.
 
The Audigy 2 is my go-to,fairly period correct sound card for XP. Unfortunately I don't think it supports DOS or Windows 98.

To answer your question a few posts up, a Soundblaster Live would be period correct as well as matching up to the games that PC can play. Half Life, NfS3/4 have EAX sound support. Make sure you get a retail one not an OEM with funky drivers!
 
Yea the audigy2 is what got my attention and with the intention of eventually doing a SLI xp machine it will be nice in that.

1 of the pcs already uses a Live so I will have a look for another.

I posted about my yamaha card on vogons and it seems its pretty desirable and somewhat rare! People talking about opl3/4 and wavetable and all I want to do is see what the transport tycoon deluxe soundtrack is like on it... :D
 
LewisRaz said:
the 99p GF2 Mx 400 (32mb) arrived today. It gets 700 more in 3dmark 99 than the 64mb variant it replaced?

Certainly cant complain for 99p.
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Was the 64mb an MX400 or an MX200? The latter would explain the performance difference. The former, well that’s just confusing unless the AIB manufacturer clocked your new one higher by default? Granted pre-overclocked examples were rarer back then (think GLH and Golden Samples)
 
paradigm said:
Was the 64mb an MX400 or an MX200? The latter would explain the performance difference. The former, well that’s just confusing unless the AIB manufacturer clocked your new one higher by default? Granted pre-overclocked examples were rarer back then (think GLH and Golden Samples)
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The old one is 100% a 400.

didn’t actually look closely at the new one just stuck it in and benched it once the drivers were on.
 
The "solder sucker" arrived today so I got to work on the 386. 5 minute job with the proper tools! Although my hand is not as steady as it once was so I probably wont post pics of the underside :D
New caps in place:


The seller had said that previously it would turn on then immediately turn off so even tho my first boot had nothing on screen the fact it stayed on was promising.. After re seating the ram:


We post :)

fitted the controller card and hdd and it booted:



Very happy with the result!

The seller has asked me to retrieve the data from the hdd if possible so now I will need to figure out a way to do that (my other IDE pcs will not boot with this drive present even tho the bios detects it properly.) Once that is done I will install a fresh DOS on it and try out some programs.
 
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